George Roy Hill Biography

Born December 20, 1921, in Minneapolis, MN; died December 27, 2002, in New
York, NY. Film director. George Roy Hill won the best director Oscar for
1973's
The Sting,
which reunited the stellar acting team of Paul Newman and Robert Redford,
who first came together in Hill's
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,
a hit film released in 1969. Both films landed on the list of top ten
grossing films of all time, making Hill the first director to have two
films on the list.

Hill grew up in Minneapolis, the son of George R. and Helen Frances Owens
Hill. He loved adventure at an early age, and was especially drawn to
aviation. He spent much of his free time at the small airport outside of
Minneapolis getting to know aviators and airplanes. He became a pilot
himself at the age of 16. He also loved classical music, and he studied
music while a student at Yale University and sang in the school's
glee club. Also at Yale, he led a drama club. He graduated from college in
1943 with a bachelor of arts degree, and immediately joined the Marine
Corps, where he served in the South Pacific during World War II as a
pilot, transporting supplies and troops.

Returning from the war, Hill moved to Texas, where he worked for a time as
a newspaper reporter. Not long after moving to Texas, however, he again
relocated, this time to Dublin, Ireland, where he continued his study of
music, adding literature to the mix at Trinity College. He returned to the
United States in 1949 after completing a bachelor's degree in
literature, and went to work as an actor. He received good reviews in an
Off–Broadway play by Strindberg called
The Creditors,
and went on tour with a reparatory company specializing in Shakespeare.
It was while working with the Shakespeare company that Hill met his future
wife, Louisa Horton. They married on April 7, 1951, and subsequently
divorced in 1978.

Following his theater work, Hill moved on to radio, where he became a
regular on a soap opera. But the outbreak of the Korean War interrupted
Hill's career in radio; the Marines recalled him to active duty,
where he served a year and a half at a flight training facility in North
Carolina. Returning to civilian life as a major, Hill found work in the
burgeoning television industry, where he worked as a writer and director.
One of his early efforts was a drama called
My Brother's Keeper,
which was based on his experiences in the military, and in which he also
acted. The show was aired on the Kraft Television Theater.

Eventually becoming a prominent television writer and director, Hill
earned Emmy awards for writing and directing
A Night to Remember,
a drama about the sinking of the
Titanic.
Hill returned to theater in 1957, directing
Look Homeward, Angel
on Broadway. This play, written by Ketti Frings, and based on a novel by
Thomas Wolfe, won a Pulitzer Prize. Other Broadway directing gigs
followed, including
A Period of Adjustment
by Tennessee Williams. That play brought Hill to Hollywood in 1962 when
he was called upon to direct the film version. The film featured Jane
Fonda in her first major film role. Hill remained primarily a film
director for the rest of his career as a director. His credits in the
1960s included
Toys in the Attic,
released in 1963, and 1966's
Hawaii.
Hill finished the 1960s with the resoundingly successful
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.
That film represented a milestone not just in Hill's career as a
director, but also for the genre of the Western film. Instead portraying
its main characters as stereotypical Western outlaws, it presented Newman
and Redford as free spirits for whom robbing banks was fun. The film, a
tremendous box office success, was credited with reviving what was then
perceived as the dying art of the Western film. It won four Academy
awards, including one for best song for "Raindrops Keep Falling on
My Head," written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David. The film also
received nominations for best picture and best director.

Hill next put Newman and Redford together in
The Sting,
which featured the duo as conmen involved in the con of their lives to
escape from a murderous gangster. This film was credited with bringing
back to popularity the music of ragtime composer Scott Joplin. It received
no less than ten Academy nominations, winning a total of seven, including
those for best picture, best director, original screenplay, and best
musical score.

Although the Newman/Redford films were very successful at the box office
and earned numerous Academy awards, they were not liked by every critic,
including longtime
New Yorker
writer Pauline Kael, who criticized both films for focusing on the
relationship between the Newman and Redford characters at the expense of
female characters. Hill responded by expressing exasperation at the idea
that he should stop the action in the films just to introduce female
characters who did not advance the plot.

Other films directed by Hill included
The World According to Garp,
released in 1982, and
Slap Shot,
released in 1977. The latter film, which was about hockey players, and
starred Newman, was initially not well received, but it gained popularity
in the years following its release. The last film Hill directed was
Funny Farm
which was released in 1988, starring Chevy Chase. After completing this
film, Hill retired from filmmaking to teach at Yale.

Hill died on December 27, 2002, in New York City of complications related
to Parkinson's disease at the age of 81. He is survived by his
sons, George Roy III and John Andrew Steele; his daughters, Frances and
Owens; and 12 grandchildren.